Hey guys,

after looking into selfhosting email it seems to me that it’s probably better if I use an existing email hoster like Namecheap or Porkbun.

Now I saw that Porkbun doesn’t offer catchall emails so I can’t use it for my usecase.

Do you guys have any recommendations for a reasonably priced email hoster for a custom domain that offers all basic features like catchall? The purpose is for one domain I use for my personal stuff and one for a small side hustle/ small business.

Thanks so much in advance for your help!

  • mechatux@lemmy.worldEnglish
    112·
    1 year ago

    Your exact use case will vary as to what is “best” - I went with Fastmail $50/yr USD) after my research a few years ago based on features I wanted. But also based on things other services didn’t do.

    • Fastmail offers granular, per-app passwords – I have a single password which has read-only access to IMAP in order to back up all the data on a timer. This feature is missing from many (many) other email providers - using the 80/20 rule, if they even offer it it’s a single password with full access (Mailfence, for example)
    • Fast, reliable incoming instant delivery is needed. I have financial services which send 2FA style codes in email (the US Treasury website for example) and need to get those via a service which is top notch. I don’t get to choose how to consume this content, it’s email or nothing
    • Fastmail allows for many domains easily, with a very nice DNS checker wizard to help you set up your records as well a keep checking them to ensure they stay correct.
    • Fastmail supports not only your catchall, but quick and easy masked emails as well for one-time use. For example, when shutting down an account on some random site I don’t want to keep spamming me, you generate a masked email, change the email on that remote account and usually get a verification email to click a link, then shut down that remote account, then delete the masked email. More than one service keeps spamming you after you shut down an account
    • Fastmail has a good spam catcher for me - it’s polling my decades old GMail and even catches spam that the GMail side miss, so I’d say it’s even one notch better than GMail at this.
    • Fastmail offers full CardDAV (contacts) and CalDAV (calendar) access, which makes plugging it into any other app that supports this very easy - their DNS wizard helps you set up the service records. I use “DavX5” on my Android to sync all Contacts and Calendar outside of using the Fastmail app (which is a self contained app on Android, it’s not too bad)
    • Fastmail has a really, really cool and easy to use Notes feature built right in that actually works without hassle. In essence it’s just an email folder where they manage HTML emails, but from a UI perspective on both the web app and mobile it’s presented as a “Notes” tab. This has come in so handy when I need to take a quick note on my mobile of any sort for looking at on a laptop later, etc.
    • Proton and Tutanota are all about marketing their encryption and security, but the reality is most of my email interacts with the outside world and this doesn’t have any bearing in real life use.
    • Proton doesn’t have “real” IMAP, you have to run some custom bridge software on your own which is highly undesirable for me; Tuta doesn’t offer any external client access of any sort. Basically, you’re either using their apps or website or you’re kinda out of luck

    I also use Mailfence as a backup on a second domain, with the emails from Fastmail being synced over via IMAP (on both sides) on a timer into a subfolder, such that if one service goes down I have a second email route ready to use. Always have a backup plan, things break when you least expect it.

    • dr_robot@kbin.social
      5·
      1 year ago

      I already posted that I recommend fastmail elsewhere in this thread, but you raised so many good points that it reminded me of some extra points :)

      Fastmail offers granular, per-app passwords – I have a single password which has read-only access to IMAP in order to back up all the data on a timer. This feature is missing from many (many) other email providers - using the 80/20 rule, if they even offer it it’s a single password with full access (Mailfence, for example)

      Since this community is about selfhosting I think it’s worth pointing out that this is AMAZING for selfhosting. I have all me selfhosted services sending e-mail via fastmail’s SMTP. With per-app passwords I don’t need to store my normal e-mail password and the apps can be limited to SMTP only (so no read access). And in case of compromise you can revoke permissions on a per-app granularity.

      Fastmail offers full CardDAV (contacts) and CalDAV (calendar) access, which makes plugging it into any other app that supports this very easy - their DNS wizard helps you set up the service records. I use “DavX5” on my Android to sync all Contacts and Calendar outside of using the Fastmail app (which is a self contained app on Android, it’s not too bad)

      Fastmail has become my contacts app now - it’s really great to have all your e-mail and contacts in the same place. The contacts don’t even need to have an e-mail address - I have a lot of contacts stored for whom I only have a phone number. I sync to android using the same DavX5 app and then immediately have these contacts in whatsapp and signal.